The cult of ITIL

It comprises 5 books of Shakespearian English flanked by huge amounts of models, figures and diagrams. It is unwieldy and complex, leaving the reader in awe of its awesome.

ITIL has thousands of followers organized in country chapters of the IT Service Management Forum. Piles of papers are written every year, ITIL projects abound, and it remains a huge industry with vendors eager to leech off the ignorance of customers. And while organizations experience real IT challenges, they all too often jump to the conclusion that ITIL is the savior.

Problem with Peter.. Peter will not take responsibility? Enforce ITIL!

Trevor and Jack won’t work together? Go for ITIL!

Lack of IT documentation? ITIL!

Sandra shows lack of motivation? ITIL!!

Ben is a horrible manager? ITIL!!!

The less passionate employees are about their job, the less they feel a strong purpose, the less they take responsibility, the more ITIL seems required.

The ITIL congregation knows that it has the ultimate solution to every issue facing an IT organization. ITIL is the answer. Never mind the question. Bring out the Powerpoints and hard hitting argument. Oversell like mad and brainwash the customer into a true ITIL believer. The cult of ITIL rolls on in the all to recognizable self-serving fashion.

Sounds like Scientology, doesn’t it?

While the differences are obvious, the similarities are striking. Method before result. The tool becomes more important than the objective.

ITIL has been around since the early 90’s. My experience dates back to the early 2000’s. I used to be an ITIL evangelist, but the glare and glitter wore off along with my many ITIL projects. I did several high profile and very successful projects, but they often succeeded despite of ITIL rather than because of it.

Few ITIL projects succeed in making customers happy. Most fail due to some serious faults in the very foundations of the framework. Like the responsibility model, the complexity of the framework, the lack of true customer focus, the lack of real service focus, the lack of people focus. And above all, the belief that a certain method yields a certain result when the input is unknown. One should be very careful trying to implement a mindset of industrialization in the human spheres. What works splendid in a factory may wreck havoc on human initiative, creativity and motivation.

It is more important to help and motivate people than to enforce tools, processes, methods. The belief in the superior process rather than the superior will to deliver excellent results is the hallmark of a failed ITIL project.

People matters. More than the rest.

This is not to say that ITIL doesn’t have some excellent tools and tips. ITIL is good at describing the playing field and different typical
positions for people to play. It points to some good practices in dealing with IT issues, incoming requests, changes to systems that affect many, etc. But as with Scientology, one has to tread carefully in a minefield and wade through some rubbish to get to the good bits. As Scientology fosters a culture of irresponsibility, ITIL tends to do the same. Not by teaching irresponsibility per se, but by focusing so much on everything else as to leave little room for real empowerment and create a culture of self-thinking, responsible people with initiative and guts.

ITIL purports itself as “Best Practice“, but I was there when Sharon Taylor, the Chief Architect for ITIL version 3, said that the framework contains about 60% Best Practice and some 40% Wishful Thinking.

The best that Best Practice can do is to create followers. Leaders innovate, tread new ground and through guts and allowing themselves to fail come up with ingenious ways of doing things even better. Broad ideas and principles may be great guidelines, but when a framework becomes too detailed, it looses its punch and becomes a one-size-fits-few.

ITIL has created hoards of followers. Resembling a cult. But we don’t need cults. Rather than producing followers, one should strive to make everyone a leader in his own work area – even if the person leads only himself to deliver great results.

A few days ago I came across a blog post that was distributed by the LinkedIn news feed titled, “Top 5 ITSM Tips for 2014“. It reads like a gust from the past and serves well to underline what I wrote above. Tip #1 “Cost-effectively implement best practice ITSM” starts off with a whiff of fluffy business English:

“Implementing best-practice IT service management not only ensures you are improving customer satisfaction and relationships with better reliability and quality of service, it will also give your service desk a competitive advantage.”

Say what? Implementing this will ensure customer satisfaction? The answer is given. Don’t mind asking the customer. Maybe they don’t need anything even resembling ITIL. Maybe they don’t even need an IT department. Maybe they just need more care from the IT staff. Maybe something else entirely.

I don’t think the health profession was ever as narrow minded as this. Enter the doctor’s office. He has already decided what you need. Without even a second of examination. “You sir, is in dire need of an appendectomy!”

The article goes on with tip #2, “Measure your success”. Now this sounds very good. Except:

“Measuring the success of your IT service desk will become ever more crucial as senior management hone down on overspending and look at ways to cut costs.”

The IT service desk… What if the customer got such amazing IT that a service desk was hardly ever needed? How about instead asking the customers what they think about the IT services and measure that instead?

Then tip #3 reads “Manage ITIL like never before”. So, instead of managing customers, and IT staff, we are lead to believe that ITIL is something to manage. Actually, it is the thing to manage. You don’t really manage ITIL or even processes. It’s like stating that the soccer manager should manage ball passing like never before. Nope. Manage the players like there was no tomorrow.

“Deal with the increased demand for accelerated delivery” is tip #4. Sound advice as long as your customers needs are assessed and as long as you are not relying on rubber stamp conclusions from analysts. Your customers matters. More than Gartner statistics.

And finally, the sales pitch for the ITIL certification industry: “Qualify your team”. If that would only advise the reader to qualify your team toward what your customers really need. But no, it means getting your staff through multiple choice questionnaires to pass a theoretical exam. A great exercise to produce followers. A louse exercise to enable IT staff to handle customers better.

The article manages to miss the major point in making IT successful – that what is really needed is motivated people that take 100% responsibility for delivering amazing service to their customers. The area of IT thrives through creative genius, people with heart, people who give it all to deliver excellent products and services, interested staff, real and honest communication and people with guts.

ITIL is traditionally very introverted. Not surprising given it’s a framework for an industry overrepresented with people having a hard time picking up girls. More extroverted contributors have come on board in recent years, but as the framework piles on with complexity, it still suffers from the internal focus.

To enhance IT, we need to inspire dedicated customer focus and a culture marked by 100% responsibility.

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167 thoughts on “The cult of ITIL”

To be honest, I’m not familiarized with this ITIL thing. But I myself am a sucker for graphics and diagrams (and for processes and methods, by the way). Once or twice I got involved in the experience of designing some of them (processes and their graphic depictions). And I can tell that sometimes you get carried away analyzing, organizing, designing and, generally, adding new stuff to your child. But when you come back later to see your masterwork, instead you find a monster so complex even you, as its creator, can’t remember what the heck was it about. The general purpose has got lost somewhere in that baroque map of circles, arrows, squares, legends, acronyms and terminologies. No wonder it drains the motivation out of anybody. No wonder you get the feeling that you miserably lost time you would’ve seized better picking up women or watching Chaplin movies.

(Come to think of it, I’ve picked up more girls and watched more movies since I left Scientology). 😀

Picking up girls? Solution for those who have this problem: make yourself available and communicate! Like in the vid as ‘lightening can strike’ any time! I keep telling my students when they have problems with it: the boys wait for the girls to start and the girls for the boys. Nice game, can last forever. They always laugh, some start and tell me about the results. Adding to it that we know that whatever problem another may have with us shows that the person actually does not see us but is communicating about his/her ‘inner reality’ which comes from the past, what can one lose then?

Thanks for the tips, Marianne. I’ll keep ’em in mind. I’ll also keep in mind that, when picking up a girl, I have to ask her name and phone number (which neither Pitt nor Forlani did in this fragment of the movie).

Yes, to exchange phone numbers is very practical. It can also happen that the genuine theta flow of the first meeting, the true
interest and some light postulate ‘attract’ a second meeting. That
is of course an ‘ideal’ situation. It can nevertheless happen, don’t
you think so?

I wonder if it is born out of systems analysis for relational databases, where optimizing data warehousing, access and reporting was paramount. The mistake, of course, is assuming that computer programs and systems are a model of human programs and systems. They are not and efforts to erect modeling / management systems that are based on that notion will soon replicate the same problems found in data warehousing, etc. Eventually the investment is enormous into the system and inputs that don’t fit, well, they don’t fit and so they are not addressed except perhaps as a workaround or a whole new add on or something. You’ll find it limping along somewhere anyway!

I guess one of the many obvious differences between humans and computers (and one of the many reasons why systems for humans based on systems for computers are doomed to fail) is the unpredictability of the former. Our expectations of computers are easier to be fulfilled than our expectations of people. Another reason may be the difference in information processing: computers process information quicker and to the point, while people process it usually slower, and at the same time in infinitely richer and more complex ways. That’s why pretending people will perform like computers (that is, people will follow procedures and systems from A to B) is just plain nonsense or the hallmark of an authoritarian system, religion or leader.

‘It is more important to help and motivate people than to enforce
tools, processes and methods.’ Absolutely true.
‘we need to inspire dedicated customer focus and a culture marked by 100% responsibility.’ Even more true.
Great post, Geir! It’s good that you put here your article which,
as I have mentioned in my earlier comments. I worked on with
some persons. They found it valid and useful. I wonder if it could
be used at a wide-scale. Do you publish it wherever you can?

Interesting article, what I see from write ups like this and the many comments on Scientology: that the method used works or not depends not on IT’s technology or Scientology how it was presented but on different factors which are present in those who use those tech.. and that is the command factor in each person’s life which guides that person., I believe that also called: Fate or Karma or Destiny.
That Karmas content is the dictating factor and will not allow any other experience to happen as it was meant to happen to that person.
There are many who believes that scientology its auditing tech works, as the same goes for IT, or other examples: other organizations like Buddhism and practicing Zen also works for many and that too is unquestionable, but not for everyone who has looked into these practises brought results..
Fate—Karma its content is the guiding factor and one cannot wipe away those factors which do control that Destiny one has to fallows… I have explored these theories and all related items which were connected to these subjects. .. I have found the causes and no matter how many Counter intentions one removes will not change that Fate one has.
While doing that exploration I have found many stops which were placed on the path in order not to attain the end product. I still have. Interestingly I wanted something else and I have removed hundreds of counter intentions yet the bloody thing never happened. It never meant to happen; it was not in my path, not written in the Book of Destiny.
 Even picking up girls, [ I never did that] but some woman I have known in the past could not squeeze a marriage proposal out of the guy they went out with,[ she is now 72 and never could get that marriage happen] no matter how smart she was and looked elegant and wanted that guy and there are others like I have been [ had to chase them of with the baseball bat, because there were so many] who was married 4 occasions and had altogether 21 marriage proposals..
Hungarians have a saying when someone is lucky because no matter what that person touches turns into gold: He/she stepped into shit.. in English saying… has the Midas touch.. it meant to happen..
I am long winded with the explanations? KARMA!

PS:: also would like to add, that not all scientology TECH.. works.. not for me.. since removing counter intentions did not make my intention materialize in solid form.. so it was not in Destiny I am fallowing.. By the way I never known It existed till I read the above post… but again I am not aware of the existence many other illusions others create.

I will answer… but I am in the middle of vacuuming .. having a cat for a companion too is interesting.. I don’t have to BE A WOMAN AND BE UNDER THE ARM OF A MAN as Dio said the females role dictates in order to save the civilisation.. but taking this role, entering into this game.. I have become a slave 🙂 also… her wish has become my command and I happily act upon that wish. 🙂

it was not the answer to your question. I have explored those concepts and I have realised that there is Karma but no matter what path one walks an there is STILL ONLY THE MOMENT OF NOW in which one can only experience the creation regardless who have created that illusion.

MT… all depends on what the person believes in. If one believes in Karma that guides that believer than that is what happening to that person.. and the belief it self is resting being stuck to that energy mass which includes pictures too.
There are many viewpoint I can take up and write about karma and I am not here to change your beliefs.

Thank you Elizabeth. I experience it the other way round. There is first some energy manifestation on top of which a belief is built.
If one takes the energy out (in whatever way), the belief is gone.
One can go the other way as well…clearing the belief. If the underlying energy (charge) is not gone, the person’s behaviour
may change but won’t get better. My reality….

You might find on the internet what karma is and how it is created by each individual… and why the person go back to being a human over and over, those gurus teachings you listen to and believe in might have the answer for that.
I only know what I experience. 🙂

Yes, as you please. Just one more thing…as you say your
nightmares stopped on OT8 as a by-product of the level ‘who
knows’ what fruits this discussion about KARMA may bring concerning ITIL? Yes…
As i said. as you please!

Reading your OP again and again it is getting clearer and clearer.
My present view: whatever we breathe life into, it will survive. If we
breathe life into the tool and not into the people, then the tool will
be ‘alive’ and not the people. If we breathe life into people, then they will be ‘creative’, will be able to decide and act, find and even
create their own ‘tools’.

Yes, asking the ‘customer’ what s/he needs…maybe more than once, until the real ‘want’ is found and provide that. Or let the
costumer provide that for him/herself….can be cases like that.

Yes, being interested, having the ability to carry out a ‘real time’
communication with the customer and having also the guts to do
that.

I’m grappling with some of the topics you’ve written about here, but not in ITIL context, rather, with an internal company project methodology. I’m responsible for defining the approaches that our team uses to elicit, document and maintain customer requirements and manage the changes to said requirements as we progress, ditto for delivering process definitions and instructions for the end user to use the system. About 50 people are directly using the approaches that I write (it’s a biiiiiig project).

I’m completely on board with 100% responsibility, and try to display such behavior. One thing that has helped me keep my responsibility level high is seeing the effect of my outputs. To see them directly, shows me that my output is a) used and b) important because it is actually used. Knowing that my work has value for others is a big motivator for me to take responsibility.

Do you see knowledge of the effect and value of ones output as a factor in acceptance and responsibility?

Geir,although you OP is evidently geared primarily for management consumption, the bottom lines are / could be reduced to the BIG question! > What is the degree of ‘duplication’ achieved by the end users? That is to say: success in terms of understanding vs. Confusion.?

Identifying and articulating exactly what the end user should duplicate is sometimes half of the problem. In a large project we have many business representatives verbally telling many business analysts what they want and this is being translated into a product by many designers and developers into a product and then instructions for using the product is written by many instructional writers. Then we expect a consistent message!

In an IT project it is optimistic to say that stakeholder are able to articulate what they want and need in sufficient detail for the subsequent phases and too often the result is that users have to duplicate the vision of the development team rather than the initial customer who defined requirements (agile methods help this though).

I compared the detail in which I define my life goals and found that that amount of detail is lacking. I don’t think it is natural to define a goals in low level detail when they goal is not expected to arrive for at least a year.

However, duplication from point to point along the IT project chain is well worth looking into.

Sorry for the response lag, as the song says, I come from a Land down under.

A couple of thoughts. I feel that those in IT are often quite far removed from seeing the end value of their work. A lot of time is spent talking about the customer and end user, but never really has any comm with the end user of the product. This may simply be a symptom of various skill sets (Business Analysts are suited to working up front to gather requirements and not to direct user support) and may be a symptom of large scale projects. A closer tie to the end effect could be useful, but I don’t know how to achieve.

When pointing out effect and value of outputs, there is also a balance between helping one realise that their output impacts many people and is valuable and should be cause for pride and rising to the responsibility and having them feel overwhelmed and pressured by it. Different people will respond differently, yes, but the way the message ‘your work is valuable!’ Is delivered can also trigger a different response.

You are right, Geir. One goes to the doctor for ‘care’ in the first
place. Health-CARE, is it not? In Hungarian ‘health’ = ‘whole’….so
when one has ‘neglected’ part of this ‘whole’ along the line for this
or that reason and cannot recall it, the doctor by asking and listening to the ‘patient’ can do wonders by just doing so…and then advise and give the proper ‘treat’ment. There is no other
way, may it be whatever interaction between two people or a person and a ‘re-PRESENT-ative’ of any organized company
which wishes to really serve a customer.

Geir, just retreading through your OP, and your summaries of each aspect, including your own ‘evolution’ in/from the instrument, I end up with the following observations

Once again, without the awareness , to step back, and evaluate the intentions of the protagonists of the movement, via transparent measurement criteria, such as YOU have just done, who the pphuucck knows, where this Jumbo 7007 is headed?

An unwieldy ‘cult’, ‘ITIL’ has clearly become! Like many monolithic structures, that regulate/corral/ herd populaces, with the expectations of unquestioning, blind obedience, it appears the similarities to the CO$ cult are not only strikingly similar, but smacks of the same deliberate frustrations in achieving REAL, meaningful integration on the human front.

Bluntly, in a way, it ‘appears to’ follow down the self same road as any other of the common garden ‘cultist practices’.

More ‘Sheeple Farming’, under a different brand name??

Moreover, is this not just ‘new age’ “ARC” in typical Cult style?
Obfuscate/enforce/crush/enforce/proliferate/enforce…..etc,etc?

I imagine there was, in the past, a need to solve a problem if IT Service delivery. Certain people worked to solve this problem and ITIL emerged. Adherence to ITIL has, according to the OP, become more important than the goal that it attempts to reach.

There was also a need to help people recover vitality in life. Hubbard worked at it and Scientology emerged. From what I read of it, it seems adherence to Scientology has also become more important than the initial goal.

There are other samples that follow this pattern.

Why then, does adherence to a tool, methodology, religion etc become more important than the goal? If the goal was achieved in one instance, does a belief that it works every time get created? Is it easier to stick with a well known method and blame it rather than looking at the goal and situation that I is actually at hand? Do creators, proponents and followers of such methodologies identify these tools as part of themselves, get too attached and and not let them go because part of them would also die? Are goals that are similar treated not as similar, but as exactly the same and can therefore be achieved in exactly the same way?

Good points. A structure of mind arises that seems to have energy, mass and inertia. I see a mind enlarging by accretion. This is education. But the ideology becoming more important than the idea — Is that inertia at work?

Seems to be either some type of inertia or an inability to let go. At the moment I think more in terms of the latter as I’ve seen it in myself.

I create something (successful in achieving its goal, of course) and the creation and the accomplishment then become part of who I am. I become attached to it, confuse it with myself and keeping it alive becomes a task in survival.

If I think about such things as something that I’ve created that was successful in achieving the goal that it was created to achieve. In other words, it just becomes something that I’ve done.

Inertia is a really interesting take. If one works at something, stands behind it, defends it against criticism, and continually creates it until it achieved the goal at that time and then gets positive energy inflow, satisfaction, pride and a sense of achievement, it’s very tempting to want to keep that going. Other people are certainly going to wrap such an achievement up as being part of who you are. Defending the ongoing ideology could be defense of what you think the public version of you is.

If you use it again and have more success, all of the above magnifies. The energy snowballs and becomes harder to stop.

Yes, on many counts of your views, as stated! At the same time, ‘re-inventing of the wheel’, might seem like a challenging task, when one is shaky, in recognizing that the feat has already been accomplished! So then going thru’ the motions, amounts to no more that just ‘busy work’, on a positive note, or even of ‘piracy’, plagiarism, (or copyright theft!) from a negative p/o/view!

Doing comparisons on thoroughly self sustaining/correcting, structural models, appears to reveal that indeed, our erstwhile ‘wheel’, was not only invented yonks ago, but has served as a fully functioning demo model, from which we can not only learn, but to use its goals and methodologies, to further our ‘own’.

Now, to cut to the chase, the model/s to which I am referring, are none other than our tried and ‘tested’ (believe it, LOL) several million -years old patented blueprint; The Human Body.

Our IT back room boffins, such as yourself & Geir, in collaboration with the brightest minds the world can offer, have given us incredible technological breakthroughs, that one can justifiable be ‘proud’ of.( needed to punt that little snippet, there, since the absence of ‘admiration’, or at the very least, some degree of acknowledgement, doesn’t seem to keep an ‘ego’ fueled for very long….. assuming said ‘ego’, is in play?} 🙂

So then, the bottom line, to which I’m pointing here, is that, imo, we already have some of the greatest systems, specifically “communication” systems, at work within our own, living, breathing work vehicles, we use every single day of our lives, often with hardly any attention whatsoever on the integrated systems, which run beautifully, just on good quality energy inputs, and paying heed to other routine needs and maintenance.

We could do worse, than studying the marvel of communication system/s we see every day, when we look in the mirror.

ups!!! Racer friend… you see in the mirror who? truly the body is doing the communication? you might want to look into your reality who is doing the communication, and what is that soft tissue machinery..[ mostly water, some minerals, and a bit of fat] and what it’s true purpose. and what it can reallllllly do. 🙂

marvel of communication is telepathy, animals use that freely, birds too 🙂 only humans because they have limited reality on true understanding on intangible communication form; telepathy have to rely on verbal communication and because of that their duplication is not very good since they don’t have, use the same meanings for those words… I think you get my meaning about communication.
I thought I throw the above post into the pot for fun.. verbal communication is the crudest form than above comes communication with sounds: variation of many different sound, than above that is communication with pictures: projection of pictures from one terminal to the other… than comes the telepathy: only thoughts directed than comes the true form of communication where one just know.

Hey Liz! 🙂 Thanks for the points You’re spot on, with your angle about this, of course! My points were aimed at the ‘hard wired’ aspects of the body! the nerves, mechanical circuits, including actual brain & sub-brain, structures, comm and relay of info systems, the whole ‘shebang’ of construction as a whole! It is a marvel of ‘engineering’ to put it crudely! That it, (the organism), is self constructing, self repairing, and self terminating, are all equally, significant, when viewed as a ‘model’ to examine as thoroughly ‘efficient communication system’ .. THAT was my point, not referring to the ‘user’, at all!
But thanks, so much for the comments anyhow… 🙂

Erzsebet? is that really you? Well, now we’ve hopefully got birth names sorted? 🙂 ….You have opened up a most ‘animated’ discussion, by addressing concepts of telepathy! I agree with your understandings pretty much! and specifically, through ‘evolution’, we have traded off much of our knowingness and/or sixth sense, in the process. Our so called ‘gains’ in knowledge, at the expense of loss in more primitive ‘intuition’ and other highly developed senses.

At the end of the day, what is total cost, of this ‘progress’, to the planet, and its other earthling inhabitants? I believe most people find themselves VERY uncomfortable, with the bare truth answer.

‘communication as a topic has been chewed over’…true…and
it is also true that lots of ‘layers have been peeled off’ since then
in case of some commentors…so maybe, if you see it that way too, please write about it, also about telepathy and ‘sixth’ sense…
there are always some new readers too.

Geir has requested to keep open this post for the comments regarding ITIL.. because of that I will not get into how and why verbal communication has become what is.. the crudest form of communication and why it is impassible to duplicate.

Getting back to IT matters, how do you present a case to a client that values methodology so highly? Do you present the A Circle principles as a simply a set of principles or as an alternate methodology?

I tend to not present A-Circle. Instead I go straight to the point. What is on the customer’s mind? What does she want to handle? And then by getting information from the customer on the problem at hand, I present a viable way to handle it. I modify as needed and gain an agreement on getting the problem handled. Then we handle that problem. No exceptions.

Me too Marianne. I’m what is known in the IT world as a business analyst so make my living asking questions. That Geir adopts a simple approach as possible seems very fitting based on other blog posts and certainly appeals to me.

Hi Maria. I agree and the KISS principle mentioned above by racingintheblood, above, is often mentioned in IT circles. The time taken to simplify is often not accounted for in the mad rush for deadline acheivement. More weight seems to be given to doing rather than figuring out the simplest way to do.

qooooooo I had a thought I want to share with you… every solution arises because one has a problem, ITIL has been a solution to its inventors problem. The same solution can not be the answer for all the problems no matter how similar those problem are. Not only low or miss duplication of the material exist by the users of ITIL but the it is not the right solution. Failure than blamed by the users that ITIL is not working…because simply it was not their bag of goods. That is the reason not much point is to give advice to others, even if the advice asked. We do not know the right answer we only assume that we know. have a lovely day. Elizabeth

Hi Elizabeth. The silence was the sound of many of my solid concepts turning to liquid. Between your comments and reading Geirs process and automation piece, ice had quite the time of introspection. I’ve started to reply a number of times, with a thought but while writing, but It rushed away, as liquid tends to do.
Thanks to you and everyone for the insights. Liquid in the mind feels good!

Oh I don’t know that.. but total vanish-mant yes! It amuses me just how wonderful we are when it comes to do magical acts… We can make things vanish with less time than a blink of an eye. Than we cry… hehehe.. I cant find it, I don’t know how to do it… it is not here, I don’t remember, I need solution but I cant find one! But one of the most interesting magical act is not understanding- miss duplicating the communication from others.. Weeeeell… putting there a big lie that we don’t understand… we don’t pick up thoughts from others..:) with that idea refined perfectly and believed in, the human race entered into a new reality playing a brand new ball game called ”acting stupid” of course ones power was also given away. and now there are jobs created which is like yours”’ annalist” even that one is mostly run on assumption: hopping that the recommendation is the right one? If I am wrong PLEASE correct me..! 🙂

Now that can be erased: those assumption… 🙂 I am sure you have had cognitions? each time one has realisation that replaces the assumption. I have read some place way back in some mag. that humans only use small part of their abilities: like 1 %? In my reality , much less than that … humans reality is mostly put together from assumptions..

realizations are pure form of understanding, because when one simply confronts something: looks at that subject-item without any thought, any intentions attached to that confrontation one sees than the true picture-reality and in that reality assumption don’t enter. assumption is when one choses the best idea and prays that chosen solution will solve that problem.

Are you talking about knowing some-thing? I tend to think that nothing exists in isolation and that things are connected to at least one other thing, usually many other things. Quantum physics seems to point a reality made up of a vast web of interconnectedness, with everything influenced by something else connected to it, if only temporarily. This leads me wonder whether one can know some-thing without knowing all of the other things influencing it. I see that I could claim to know something by looking closely at it but if it’s is-ness is constantly being influenced by external things that I don’t know, it seem that I could only know it for an instant.

instant is the only existence.. yes? there is no past or future but one can have so many view points of the same, hundreds of them and which is real, which are illusions, which was c created by you or by some body else, are you view that item or you see it through some bodies eyes? what you viewing exist now or a picture from the past or compounded images and all belongs to some other persons who created them or just believe they are the owners? k
Knowledge only exist if all those uncertainties are confronted and replaced by cognitions which are the true knowledge therefore they don’t have mass-pictures and the cognitions=the wording too vanish.. when there is a cognition on item that is the fact, the truth for the person who has that but that cognition belongs to the entity only and the truth only for that entity. Yes, and everything has the connection to everything.. But again those connections can be erased and are erased in session. Example: you are in a battle an kill others and be killed… before the battle through communication many connections were made, but not only by you but every soother person. whe you confronted that incident you have erased all the connection you have made and you have released those who were invisibly connected to you. But those individuals need to confront their activity in that battle also. Every time you look at something, some body you make a connection, also you leave behind some energy at that point. Your consideration will remain there. Example: what a beautiful garden, or great looking body etc.. in session, just in ONE session one can erased immense amount of stale connections when one erases that thought, attitude, sensation, emotion etc. My cat wants to play.. her wish is my command 🙂

Gotcha. So once you’ve isolated the problem you recommend an appropriate solution that draws on a selection of appropriate toolset on a grab bag that you’ve experienced over your career rather than a defined ‘methodology’.

I can understand that you don’t present anything other than a recommended solution to the problem at hand. The A Circle website presents things like 100% responsibility, which are probably more like principles than methodology. How do these principles influence the selection of a recommended solution? If they are an influence, do they not form part of the justification of your recommendation?

‘…do they not form part of the justification of your recommendation?’ Very relevant question! Before Geir answers,
let me give one example of one ‘method’ he posted and I applied
it in case of a girl – the result is ‘far-reaching’ responsibility and
a markedly improved and imroving life. If you like, read my ‘reports’ in the link. As I see it, when the ‘principles’ are ‘natural’
principles, the results are also ‘natural’.

I am also waiting for Geir’s answer and perhaps he could give
other examples and ‘methods’ as well.

MT; “””natural: spontaneous, represents the qualities of life, thus not altered in any way (which may happen by thought”””
All thought are spontaneous, to the person and represent something to the person who has those thoughts. and who is to say that those concepts are bad or good? that would means evaluation that one concept has more value than others. truly human way of thinking.
What is natural and spontaneous on this Planet?

Thank you, Elizabeth. ‘WHO is to say?’ i get it. WHO=SOURCE
does not ‘evaluate’…as all which is manifested is ‘one-source-manifested’. Each thought, emotion…is THAT….’equal’ in ‘value’, just different.
…an interesting thing is happening here now partly due to your
com Eliz…i have so far misperceived the value of ‘thought’ in Change and Experience..thank you Elizabeth.

Yes my dear Friend… all thoughts are equal in values, the words are different, have different meanings of course but not in value. Ruby is considered valuable and shown off by being placed in precious setting, a pebbles on the side of the road are invisible. Who put the value on the ruby and why the pebble is invisible?

Yes, there are a few principles that are part of Most of our recommendations – like keeping things really simple, creating measurable results, focus on the results/delivery and 100% responsibility and empowering people. And then there is the huge bucket of possible methods and tools that are usable in various situations 🙂

Good answer. I had a re-read of the OP and found this point in the article matches my thoughts in particular ‘Broad ideas and principles may be great guidelines, but when a framework becomes too detailed, it looses its punch and becomes a one-size-fits-few.’

Have you found that companies actually use pure ITIL or they go to at least the trouble of tweaking it to suit their individual needs?

My role is basically to select tools and decide how we will employ the tools selected to take us to the desired goal. I always get the view of others that have used the tool and those that have consumed the output that is produced using the tool. I get buy in and then explain the tool, the usage and the reasons behind it to the team, so communication and motivation of the team are big themes for me. I have the ability to move inside the greater methodology. To an extent, I feel that I am creating the methodology as the next goal comes up. In doing so, I expect a certain level of adherence to the use of the tools as the consumers of what we produce have certain expectations.

How strict are you on your people to adhere to the above principles?

Then, once the tools have been selected to solve the problem how much to you enforce adherence to using them? If you’ve chosen to take an Agile approach and document the customer needs in Epics and User Stories that are written to a certain standard, how important is adherence to that set of standards?

I don’t get the chance to discuss IT methodologies and principles in this manner very often. Most people I deal with seem to look to the methodology for an answer and if they can’t find it there blame it for being incomplete.

The chance to learn the opinion of someone I highly respect is too good to pass up.

Most of the questions you pose is answered in the article linked in the OP (the very last link – Processes, Automation and Human Potential).

We focus on the result, the end product, the actual value, the outcome. Any tool, methodology or principle is only as good as it serves the purpose, the outcome, the result, the package delivered, the deliverable, the value. We strictly focus on that end result, the deliverable. The rest is only strictly focused on to the degree it helps in achieving the aim, the package, (etc). If it helps, we help its use. But never if it doesn’t help or if it detracts from the end result.

I recently encountered this extraordinary material, which I believe speaks deeply the the issues covered in your article Geir, and also to the underlying hunger that has been contributing to the growth of open source and a gift based economy:

M…….
What makes the Human Race is their belief, their convictions and in these beliefs how to make it go right as a human race is missing… use up, destroy everything is the key element in human beliefs. Even nature itself continually renew it self and what it uses to survive on?
I wondered once why this urge exist to kill, destroy everything… I found the reason and in was interesting and made lot of sense.
Have you noticed those who believe that they are entities-spiritual beings live quietly, have simple needs, simple life and live on very little and they don’t have wants?
The H. race is heading headlong into what its best creation.. destroying it self.. the body only of course and nothing will stop that 🙂 …

I like your reality… by now that too ”the initial creativity” is went on automatic…the original power which has created Nature has been diluted.. weakened by the human interference so Nature losing the battle to renew it self. my reality as usual.

Just asking, how that system (or any system) would apply over ‘just a simple man with a growing twist’ who didn’t think it was possible to become a powerful con-man that would move thousands of minds, would create a new religion and would change the entire world, to good or bad, but change it anyway..? how that would apply over the people helping that man achieve what he previously didn’t think it was possible? I mean, I wonder while aiming at 100 % of responsability.

I really wonder if there could exist a ‘flawless system’ or method over the outcome of the power of individuality and total freedom inside a morally-patriarchal society. Keeping in mind the Scientology FPRD, how it was intended and how it is used today.

Ok, I messed up. The too dispersed question is too dispersed. I’m going to focus further as you are the one who is going to answer and as far as I have read your thoughts from your social networks. (everyone else is free to share their thoughts of course)

I’m going to suppose you are a libertarian and any model of service management would work as a political libertarism. As is, we concern on the method of the delivery itself, in the technical improvement, in the most efficient paradigm. Suppose we won’t reach perfection, but we are close with our little error margins and high standars in the products. But to simplify, lets say we accomplish our postulated goals and fulfill all the premises that back up our model.

But the problem is that we are working with people’s minds and our final products are those same people. There will be our own evaluation (or from our applied model) over the improvements of those people, and there will be the evaluation from the world, other people and other models, and they will be very much interested in their performance. As we are looking for a model, system or methodology, of 100 % responsability, I am not clear how far that responsability goes. I mean, I lean to think that we are not responsible for the acts of others, or at least not more than 50/50 in the generating process of a peer-to-peer interaction. I think that very 50/50 is the process of improvement and performance, we have done our part, the rest depends over the client. We reach our goal, the client reach his goal. Everyone reach their goals and the model reach its goal as functional or effective.

But the problem is that we are working with people’s minds and our final products are those same people. There will be our own evaluation (or from our applied model) over the improvements of those people, and there will be the evaluation from the world, other people and other models, and they will be very much interested in their performance. As we are looking for a model, system or methodology, of 100 % responsability, I am not clear how far that responsability goes. I mean, I lean to think that we are not responsible for the acts of others, or at least not more than 50/50 in the generating process of a peer-to-peer interaction. I think that very 50/50 is the process of improvement and performance, we have done our part, the rest depends over the client. We reach our goal, the client reaches his goal. Everyone reaches their goals and the model reaches its goal as functional or effective.

My question is:

No matter how scientifically our model could be, if we accomplish our goal and the client gets more powerful about their capacity and impact over his enviroment, the motivation of improvement itself would need to be guided or regulated somehow?
What if the client wants to improve himself to become a conman and cheat the world? What if we are helping Hitler to reach his goal? What if we have well done our job and the consecquences of the improvement No matter how scientifically our model could be, if we accomplish our goal and the client gets more powerful about their capacity and impact over his enviroment, the motivation of improvement itself would need to be guided or regulated somehow?
What if the client wants to improve himself to become a conman and cheat the world? What if we are helping some Hitler to reach his goal? What if we have done our job well and the consecuences of the improvement gets the worst case scenario in the future, like an assasination or something similar. I’m exagerating, but that’s the idea. We will be ok with our model and with our goal reached, nothing more. Just delivering what is requested, technical and detached, like the organized mafia, like a nazi business or corporation and his HR department.

Ok, I messed up. The too dispersed question is too dispersed. I’m going to focus further as you are the one who is going to answer and as far as I have read your thoughts from your social networks. (everyone else is free to share their thoughts of course)

I’m going to suppose you are a libertarian and any model of service management would work as a political libertarism. As is, we concern on the method of the delivery itself, in the technical improvement, in the most efficient paradigm. Suppose we won’t reach perfection, but we are close with our little error margins and high standars in the products. But to simplify, lets say we accomplish our postulated goals and fulfill all the premises that back up our model.

But the problem is that we are working with people’s minds and our final products are those same people. There will be our own evaluation (or from our applied model) over the improvements of those people, and there will be the evaluation from the world, other people and other models, and they will be very much interested in their performance. As we are looking for a model, system or methodology, of 100 % responsability, I am not clear how far that responsability goes. I mean, I lean to think that we are not responsible for the acts of others, or at least not more than 50/50 in the generating process of a peer-to-peer interaction. I think that very 50/50 is the process of improvement and performance, we have done our part, the rest depends on the client. We reach our goal, the client reach his goal. Everyone reach their goals and the model reach its goal as functional or effective.

My question is:

No matter how scientifically our model could be, if we accomplish our goal and the client gets more powerful about their capacity and impact over his enviroment, the motivation of improvement itself would need to be guided or regulated somehow?
What if the client wants to improve himself to become a conman and cheat the world? What if we are helping some Hitler to reach his goal? What if we have done our job well and the consecuences of the improvement gets the worst case scenario in the future, like an assasination or something similar. I’m exagerating, but that’s the idea. We will be ok with our model and with our goal reached, nothing more. Just delivering what is requested, technical, like the organized mafia, like a nazi business or corporation and his HR department.

The beauty of having less methods that does the thinking or acting for you, the more you have to rely on Yourself when helping another reach his or her goal. And in relying on yourself, you rely on your own personal integrity and ethics as to whom you want to help. As for me, I only help people I truly like, and that mostly mean people with a high degree of empathy.

I see. Is like saying that we can ‘easily’ know and see if we met people with high degree of empathy, or if we realize that we are facing a psychopath or sociopath, a person ‘scientifically-proven’ that cannot feel empathy. There are degrees of this though, and there are fantastic researches on this that involves the amygdala. Thank you, this means A LOT. My thought is that despite knowing too much theory, we can easily be cheated by a psychopath in the experience. A person that doesn’t live the effects of a psychopath on his life doesn’t really know or have a poor picture of what is a psychopath. Don’t even talk about trying to HELP a psychopath, not just trying to avoid him but really trying to improve that condition. Seems imposible, at least for counseling and coaching. Maybe an invasive neuroscientific treatment could take on this. Of course against what Scientology would think.

LOL. That is a lot to worry about. Don’t worry though, a lot more processes than we could ever bring together in the world would be needed to create a super-villain. Or a super-anything for that matter.

Chris: Are these two my only choices and do I only get to pick one? Could I say pick that LRH came about through the enormous iterations that occur as natural processes in the universe? Does a genius or mongoloid child need to be only a miracle or accident? There are many explanations for the way things are.

Chris: Yes, I believe that we can zero in our concentration on simpler and also more complex views of reality. This seems to be a trait of our species to bring our mental energies to bear and to focus on various orders of magnitude. And yet, so far, both ends of this spectrum of the microscopy and enormity of space-time defy human observation and experience. Perhaps we cannot do this because because our minds are a subset of the universe that we try to resolve? Possibly existence begins very simply and yet it seems to be the enormous orders of magnitude which leave our thinking behind? That is how I think about it.

Most interesting post you have written.. I been rereading it and doing my best so sort out the hidden meanings which you hid in other meanings. Well camouflaged form of thoughts and only you know what they are. hehehe.
Are you by any chance a lawyer or a politician?
You are out of the CofS. and because speaking of your thought openly no one will make you do some crazy ethic lists or cut you tong out as it would be ordered by Attila the Hun- [myself here]
So if you care to say the name and the crazy new religion.. do say so.. Hell, we all do and look at us, we are here still commenting, me for example been chewed to shred few time, swallowed and spitted out.. hehehe and of course returned the same.. so Stand upon your hind legs as we all have and say what you really would love to say..

Sorry for the confused post and the potential misinterpretation. I don’t need protection, my opinion is that this is Internet and I take it as what it is, so you don’t need to know anything irrelevant from me. Even in the case of forming a mental picture or judging, I think the less you know about personal information of other people on the Internet, the more protection that goes for your clean and neutral reasoning.

But as I see you tried to fish up something from my ‘hidden meanings’ while you are saying nothing, nothing that gives me the clue that you understand my point or not, I’m going to clarify further my motivation. You know that I was talking about L. Ronald Hubbard, right? I mean, that was not so hidden anyway. I’m going to develop my point in other post for a matter of organization.

There is a new L. Ronald Hubbard every day. New clones appear by the time. In fact, I have a ‘friend’ that is a modern Hubbard (I state it between quotes because you know how a really good friend anybody would be with Hubbard and his attitudes, even at the most sutil level).
But not matter how close to its original the imitation could be. As stated by the Chaos Theory, everything always will be different, even for looking the same from a fresh spot. But despite that, we see that the history repeat itself, we see the same mistakes like we haven’t learned a bit yet. Or at least it seems we didn’t.
A guy appears, with the same arguments, the same evasions, maybe a different twist, a different life, but creates a new cult, a newborn spiritual movement that have all the answers, with all the explanations about all the universe and every little aspect of it. And if you follow deep into the rabbit’s hole, following the golden path, you will see the same motivation: POWER. If it’s not about money, it’s about power as its essential.
So, a powerless man on his way of achieving and manage more power. A miserable and solitaire man, as a reflection of humanity itself, trapped in a patriarchal society.

What do we know about power?
How can we help to empower and innovate humanity?
When and where can we move into the perfect flow of change?

“Here and now”. Or just playing the words in “nowhere”, I like that nowhere. Like the vaccum or void.
But my questions were rhetorical, so there is no point in answer myself just to satisfy your exercise.

Thanks for your reply.
‘But my questions were rhetorical, so there is no point in answer
myself just to satisfy your exercise’.
I get what you mean and i don’t have the slightest intention to
ask you to do any exercise which would be against your satisfaction of asking rhetorical questions.

Erase your reality:your beliefs that you don’t have power while you doing that confrontation you will discover that you have power. Don’t bother with the human race… you need to clear your own closet out first before and when that happens that will effect the human race and the Universe.. You might even have the power much as LRH had without the downside you are so hang up on. Easy to be a critic… show us what you have done so far which have improved the condition of the universe but so far you only added negative thoughts putting down many and with that you have placed yourself above those persons.. well prove it that you are better, know more than those who you so easily put down. You have it in you. but where is it? LRH dare to put out what he had, regardless what we considered of that…and that was his best. What is yours?

Are all those questions rhetorical as well? Yes, is easy to put all those words against Hubbard on his history, like he was so hung up against enemies. Showing lies. Improving the mambo-jambo that doesn’t qualify or mean anything to humanity itself. Manipulating with positive thoughts (not negative, too easy to be aware of that). Making up status, degrees and stuff about being better just for getting credibility, not because he was evil. Yes, he dare to put out what he was full of. But, ‘regardless what we considered of that’?…’and that was his best’?

Ok, here there is a MU (like scientologists often likes to abbreviate). There is a MU because I don’t bother on the personal issues of LRH, like saying he was a drug-addict and paranoic (that he was), I’m hang up on the very macroscopical consequences of his impact on society after accepting, as the more neutral I can be, all of what he was. Then, I am focusing on the extrapolation of his attitudes in people from our time, people with the same potential and personal issues. Then I am asking because I know people that generated an impact and change his behavior just like LRH did on his time. And yes, there is more negative consecuences than positives, or putting it in other form, there are neutral consecuences as their best. What a neutral consecuence mean for me? an outcome that could alternatively be exchanged for whatever else resulting in the same or even something better. I mean, this is all relativism, pure relativism at their most relativist relativism. Because if something different would mean something better, then I can make up a coaching program with cero criteria, just introducing change, even playing with people as a psychopath would do. But I’m not arguing about placebo or scientific skepticism or bad science or intellectual dishonesty, I’m arguing about learning from history as we have that history to learn from. We have results. We have scientology as a result on which rely many lessons and learnings. What are those results?

The answers to the following questions:
What is the really impact of scientology on the world?
What is the really statistical improvement of scientology on a clinical control group?
What is the truly reliability of scientology?
What is the truth about scientology and the motivations behind: its orgs, its lider, its founder, its members, etc.?

Sooner or later you will get out of the pile of shit you are sitting in since the stink of it will get to you, by the way the shit is yours. Who twisted your arm to be there, who told you to listen to it all.. ?? just because you don’t like how you feel what is in your universe you want to blame others that they have put it there and you are now a victim…. poor you… violins are playing and we all crying and crocodile tear rolling down our invisible faces. get yourself a new life.. different reality. and I bet you have equal overts in you past,,, since no beings is sweet smelling as you believe you are.

Since I don’t see any reason what so ever for me to change your way of thinking.. and I know that your realities are solid as diamonds… my viewpoints have no effect in your solid universe..and your views are old washed over therefore meaningless to me: offer nothing I can learn from, so I don’t see any reason for continuing the communication I take my leave here. Be well!

yes.. Vinaire… that is the fact.. and tell me what make you believe that the speed of light is misunderstood? and what would happen if different theory would come to light? [hehehe, I could not resist that!] By the looks of it you are missing my arousing comments.

… And you are missing the philosophy of cosmology on my blog (Hehehe… I could not resist that!).

Anyway, it is the concept of inertia that is not understood, and along with it the idea of ‘inertial frame of reference’. I am about to write an essay on the ‘inertial frame of reference.’ Hopefully I shall be able to publish it today.

I am also giving a math lesson to Chris Thompson today on Skype. I know you are not interested in such things. They are not sexy enough for you. 🙂 .

yes darling… I miss you terribly.. I cant sleep at night.. hehehe and my knickers are in twist from worry that I might miss something and because of that will burn forever in the Hell of UNKNOWABLE! 🙂 PS: I had to look up the word ”inertia” yet I still don’t understand what you are looking for… care to explain simply of course.

Gordo …. there is no such a thing existing or will ever be invented which could create “”FLAWLESS SYSTEM””” for a very simple reason because ” flawless-ness”’ exist only in the universe of each individual. Perfection is a viewpoint and nothing more.

Gordo… one more from me: the toothless old hag..
I been thinking what good advice you should be given if –in case you continue post here, the advice is for your protection of course.
For one, get combat gear and get rabies shot, the gear will protect you from evaluation and invalidation and the rabies shot for against self just in case… so you won’t be thinking that you went totally mad while reading some of the answers on your comments. 🙂

I’m not sure if this, yes, this entry about making cults around the service management models like ITIL is the best topic to link with this, but considering that the feedback of commenters and all the people participating is part of this viral influence or internet phenomenon of degrees of ex-scientologists becoming free thinkers, I see relevant to share this article to all commenters, casual readers and buzzfeeders.

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